Solar energy is an affordable, inexhaustible and clean energy that will have huge longer-term benefits when comparing to the pollution and shortage of fossil energy. Among all the practical applications of solar energy, solar cell, being an electrical device that converts the energy of light directly into electricity by the photovoltaic effect, is becoming an important building block for future alternative energy program.
Generally, solar cells that are designed for long-term outdoor usage would be made of materials with good ability to withstand the effects of wind, rain, or sun and to retain its appearance and integrity, i.e., it would be designed with good weather resistance. When it comes to solar cell and also its package materials that are used to operate under the exposure of sunlight for a considerable long period of time, the ability to resist ultraviolet is one of the factors to be considered as ultraviolet is one of the causes of material degradation.
In a condition when a material aging test is performed using man-made light source, such as xenon lamp, ultraviolet lamp whichever capable of simulating solar light illumination, however under the restriction of their operation modes, such man-made light sources are generally large-area light sources that can project large-area uniform output upon a sample object, but with weaker illuminance per unit area. Under the circumstance, one way for increasing the speed of aging is to increase the intensity of the light sources used in the aging test. Nevertheless, the light source that can project beam with high intensity can likely cause the sample to overheat, which is going to affect the final result of the aging test. Moreover, since most light sources that are currently used in the aging test are designed for large-area aging, they may not be used for focusing their projection only on a specific area of a sample so that different areas of the sample may not be exposed by light sources of different illuminances. In addition, most aforesaid light sources that are currently used in the aging test emit beams within a specific wavelength range, that they might not be able to be conditionally fine tuned for enabling the same to produce a beam of a specific wavelength.
Thereafter, a spectral measurement is performed upon the sample after aging test so as to be used as the base for adjusting and controlling aging test parameters. For the manufacturers of related arts, the aging test apparatus and the spectrum measurement apparatus are two devices that are generally independent of each other as the light sources suitable for the aging test is different from those suitable for the spectral measurement. Therefore, in most cases, the sample after completing the aging test would be removed from the aging test apparatus and transported to a test platform of an independent spectrum measurement apparatus.
Therefore, it may be in need of an apparatus and method with enhanced aging test efficiency that are able to perform a spectral measurement simultaneously with the proceeding of an aging test.